Enhancing Presentations for the Multimedia generation

I cannot resist also pointing out that if it is detrimental to perform socially-isolated activities with a two-dimensional surface rather than interacting with real people in a 3D world, then we should be discouraging children from reading books.

Sadly, what we found was that even when technology tested well in experiments, the attempt to scale up its impact was limited by the availability of strong leadership, good teachers, and involved parents — all elements that are unfortunately in short supply in India’s vast but woefully underfunded government school system. In other words, the technology’s value was in direct proportion to the instructor’s capability.

Over time, I came to think of this as technology’s Law of Amplification: While technology helps education where it’s already doing well, technology does little for mediocre educational systems; and in dysfunctional schools, it can cause outright harm.